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2014 Lawrence Lecture and Negotiation Competition

2014 Lawrence Lecturer Grande H. Lum on Peacemaking in America

September 30 @ Noon in Saxbe Auditorium

Director Lum will speak about the role of the United States Department of Justice’s Community Relations Service (CRS) in meeting the conflict resolution and conciliation needs of communities throughout the United States. CRS and its regional offices have been at the forefront of developing customized and proactive solutions to help bring communities in conflict together and enable them to independently prevent and resolve existing and future concerns.

Grande H. Lum has served as Director of CRS since 2012. Before joining CRS, he taught at the University of California at Berkeley School of Law and Stanford Law School and was a clinical professor at the University of California Hastings School of the Law, where he directed its Center for Negotiation and Dispute Resolution. Prior to his tenure at Hastings School of Law, Mr. Lum was the founder of Accordence, a dispute resolution training firm; a principal of ThoughtBridge, a mediation firm; and a partner with the consulting firm Conflict Management Incorporated. His published works include The Negotiation Fieldbook, which is currently in its second edition. Mr. Lum received his B.A. from the University of California at Berkeley, and his J.D. from Harvard Law School.

The President Speaks on Iraq and Ferguson: “We’ve also had experts from the DOJ’s Community Relations Service working in Ferguson since the days after the shooting to foster conversations among local stakeholders and reduce tensions among the community.” (The President mentions CRS’ work in Ferguson at the 5:35 mark on the video.)

Sanford, Florida, Mayor Urges Ferguson to Welcome Obama Administration’s Help: Jeff Triplett, the part-time mayor of the town where Trayvon Martin was shot, says the Justice Department saved the day in Sanford. Justice Department officials are engaged in Ferguson in full force, with six agencies on the ground in the Missouri town coordinating a federal investigation into the death, monitoring police behavior and trying to build a bridge between authorities and protesters through a previously little-known department branch called the Community Relations Service. The agency, which has ten regional offices across the country, is specifically designed to diffuse tension after discrimination-charged events and was established as part of the 1964 Civil Rights act. On Wednesday, the head of CRS, Grande Lum, will be in the Justice Department party accompanying Attorney General Eric Holder on his trip to Ferguson.

Department of Justice Representatives Stress Communication at Friday Night Meeting: Two representatives of the Community Relations Service of the Department of Justice, Eric Dean and Rita Valenciano, stressed they were reporting the needs of the St. Louis community to their superiors. Although the goal of the evening was set as a time for community members to ask questions of the two representatives, little insight emerged as to their roll. Valenciano stressed she was in Ferguson Aug. 10 and immediately began working with community groups to facilitate dialogue with law enforcement and government agencies.

Hands Up, Don’t Shoot: A Case for the Community Relations Service: In an era when the federal government is often demonized as a tyrant imposing its will on the states, CRS illustrates how a tiny federal agency with minimal resources can collaborate effectively with state and local officials, providing valuable expertise in a tense and challenging environment.

Holder Visits With Students, Community Leaders, Michael Brown’s Family in Ferguson: Shortly before 1 p.m., Holder attended a closed-door meeting at the school. The Community Relations Service organized the meeting with about 50 Ferguson residents, according to the attorney general’s office. “The eyes of the nation and the world are watching Ferguson right now,” Holder told them, according to a transcript provided later by his office. “This is something that has a history to it, and the history simmers beneath the surface in more communities than just Ferguson.”

Every fall, Moritz students compete in the intramural Lawrence Negotiation Competition, named for James K.L. Lawrence (’65). The winners and runners-up in this week-long competition move on to Regional and National Negotiations Competitions, which the American Bar Association conducts.

During the competition, teams of two law students working as advocates for a fictitious client negotiate against one another. They are judged on their ability to work together, establish rapport with the opposing team, and maximize the interests of their client. Every team competes in the first two rounds, after which the competition becomes single elimination.

Working with the Moot Court and Lawyering Skills Program, the Program on Dispute Resolution (PDR) enriches the competitors’ experience in two ways. First, PDR hosts a speaker with a distinguished career as a negotiator. Second, PDR conducts a negotiation workshop for students who have no prior experience in negotiating to introduce them to effective negotiation skills and strategies and to prepare them for the competition.

These events, together with the competition itself, create an engaging and stimulating learning experience for all participants.

Any Moritz student may participate in any aspect of the week-long event; those students pursuing the Certificate in Dispute Resolution may earn Externship hours through their participation.

James K. L. Lawrence ’65

James K. L. Lawrence (’65) is a partner with Frost Brown Todd in Cincinnati. Following graduation from law school, he worked as an attorney at the National Labor Relations Board. He left the Board to join his firm and, for more than 30 years, has practiced labor-relations and employment law. He is a skilled advocate in arbitration and an astute negotiator in collective bargaining and settlement discussions.

He has pursued vigorously the sustained study of dispute resolution materials at programs throughout the country, including the Program on Negotiation at Harvard, and has blended that study and practice into teaching courses in negotiation and mediation at Moritz and at the University of Cincinnati Law School.

He has given generously of his time, talent, guidance and resources to Moritz and our Program on Dispute Resolution over the years, so it is perfectly fitting that this expanded educational enterprise with Negotiation at its core be conducted in his name.

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